Field of the Invention
Some embodiments relate to the general field of telecommunications.
Some embodiments described herein relate to the secure management of the provision of a location-based communication service between two mobile terminal users, delivered by a server of a service provider. In particular, some embodiments described herein relate to a method for secure exchanges between the mobile terminals of two users via a services platform as a function of location information.
Description of the Related Art
Many mobile services currently use location-based to propose personalized services to the user of a mobile phone as a function of his location. But obtaining such location information of the mobile phone by service application generally requires the consent of the user. This has several disadvantages. First of all, such consent generally requires voluntary action of the user, in the form of text to be read, box to tick, button to click etc. . . . . This requires time, consumes resources and can push a user to abandon the use of such a service. On the other hand, the location of the user can be considered by the latter as a sensitive datum, too personal to be shared with others, more importantly with a sometimes commercial mobile service; all the more so since transfer of location-based data to a mobile service provider generally passes via the Internet network, not very secure, exposing these data to possible hacking by unscrupulous individuals, during their transfer or their storage on the provider servers. The user can consider that the confidentiality of his personal data is not guaranteed. For this reason some users can be encouraged to abandon use of a mobile service rather than confide location-based data in it. Finally, presentation of a request for consent to share location-based data and mobile applications using such data generally requires the display of an evolved graphic interface, for example to display a considerable quantity of text such as conditions of use, or else cartographic data. Because of this, the majority of current mobile applications using location-based can be used only on mobile phones fitted with large screens, such as “smartphones”, depriving owners of mobile phones with small screens of such applications.
There is a need for a communication solution enabling a service provider to communicate with a mobile phone to provide it with a service as a function of the location-based zone of this mobile phone, without requesting the user for consent for transmission of location-based data.
Among services offered by existing service providers are linking services between various users of these services. Such services are proposed by various social network or instant communications applications. During an event such as a trade fair or a festival such applications can be employed to link participants to such an event. However, existing applications generally require identification of the user with the service provider and the identity of the user is generally shared with other users to whom the user is linked. This enables solicitation of the user by the provider of the service or by other users outside the site and duration of the event in which the user is participating, impinging on his private life.
There is therefore also a need for a solution to secure exchanges between two mobile phones, so that neither the provider of the communications service nor the other users ever has knowledge, both of the position and identity of a user of a mobile phone, and the private life of the latter is respected.